| [Aug. 23rd, 2014|04:52 am] |
Ryouma went suddenly still. “Shit. Were we supposed to bring that back?”
There was a beat of silence.
“Was his head intact?” Raidou asked.
Kakashi thought of warm, meaty rain exploding behind his back. Bones ripped apart by weaponized blood. There’d been an arm left. The lightning strike had probably fused Iebara’s dogtags into unreadable slag.
“Probably not,” he said.
Raidou shrugged. “A clean up team can sponge up whatever the storm didn’t wash away, but if he’s in shreds Intel won’t get much from him anyway. I wouldn’t worry about it.”
But Raidou looked a little worried, all the same. Probably because a team would take the better part of a week to get there, and animals and decay would take what the storm hadn’t. Whatever secrets Iebara’s remains carried were long gone and lost.
Kakashi said, “Next time I’ll take a bucket.”
Ryouma snorted. Katsuko laughed in Kakashi’s ear. Raidou cracked a smile, and even the lieutenant chuckled.
“Collecting the remains was on me,” Genma said. “We have Iebara’s commanding officer. That’s gotta be better than a bucket of slime as far as Intel’s concerned.”
“Point,” Raidou said. He leaned over and tapped Genma’s elbow. “Y’know, we’re still waiting on your guess, Shiranui.”
“Swimming with dogs is the lie,” Genma said decisively. “There might have been dogs around, but ninja parents make sure their kids know how to swim properly.” After a fractional beat, he added, “Except maybe in Suna.”
“Accurate,” Raidou said. “On both counts.”
Kakashi thought about it while Katsuko’s fingers slid through his hair, putting the final elastic band into place. She brushed her palm over the sticky-up tufts, making his head rock gently from side to side. It made the room waver, full of black and gold shadows.
At last he said, “I don’t remember what I said.”
“Oh my god,” Katsuko said.
Raidou propped his chin on his hand. “I’m seeing the flaw in making it Hatake’s go now.”
Calmly, Ryouma tapped warm fingers against the top of Kakashi’s foot. “One, you learned to swim by doggy-paddling in the river with real dogs.” Another tap checked off each line. “Second, Minato-sensei—it feels really weird to call him that—once forgot it was Valentine's until just before he was supposed to meet Kushina-sama, and tried to steal your personal plant as a present for her. Which I still think means he didn't succeed, and you caught yourself up in a lie,” he said, like arguing semantics with a drugged man was a winning strategy. “Third, last year you got offered the elderly discount for a spa in Tea Country, which is also pretty ridiculous now that I think about it. Spas involve getting naked in front of other people.”
Maybe the advantage of not knowing how to read was perfect aural recall.
“Wow,” said Kakashi, fascinated. “You should do that at parties.”
Ryouma smiled crookedly. “Does this count? We’re playing party games.”
“I guess so,” Kakashi said, and finally managed to re-achieve his point. “Lieutenant's right. I learned to swim in our pond with my dad. Dogs weren’t allowed to join in until I could keep my head above water.”
He hadn’t thought about that in years.
Light on water and big, careful hands, and the feeling of absolute safety, back when that was a thing which existed.
He let it slip away. Right now there were laughing teammates and ties in his hair, and he only hurt a little. Ryouma was making a face of betrayal and demanding to know what kind of spas catered to elderly people with six packs, while Katsuko hooted and mocked his deductive skills. Genma was smiling the small, pleased smile of victory, and Raidou leaned against his own fist, looking tired and fond.
Kakashi slouched down lower in his warm, borrowed blankets and smiled at them, half-lidded. “I like this game,” he decided. |
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